Peter Wexler has been working for six decades in performance art, as a designer of scenery, costumes, lighting, concerts, performance space, and outdoor concert facilities, as well as a producer and as a studio artist. His credits include designs for Broadway (The Happy Time, Cameno Real, The Trial of the Catonsville Nine); off-Broadway (War and Peace, Anthony and Cleopatra, Brecht on Brecht); The Metropolitan Opera, 1951-1954 and 1970-2004 (Les Troyens, Le Pophete, Un Ballo in Maschera); The New York Philharmonic, 1965-2004 (The Rug Concerts, The Promenades Concerts); The Boston Symphony, 1995-1999 (The Pops); The Los Angeles Symphony (Hollywood Bowl); and the Dallas Symphony Orchestra.

He helped found regional theatres (the Mark Taper Forum, 1965-2004 and the Pittsburgh Public Theatre, 1975-1980) and consulted on TV design (The Merv Griffin Show, The ABC World News with Peter Jennings). He has produced large outdoor music festivals featuring artists such as the Dixie Chicks, Willie Nelson, Van Cliburn and Mstislav Rostropovich. He has also produced large exhibitions (The Smithsonian Institution, The Tramell Crow Co.) and has consulted on the design of theatres and concert performance spaces including the Carlos Moseley Music Pavilion in Central Park, NY, which he conceived and produced.

His art is to be found in many public and private collections (The Smithsonian Institution, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Lincoln Center and The Tobin Collection at the McNay Art Museum).

The Duke Library at Furman University in Greenville, SC is currently digitizing all of his projects for online archival educational availability as THE PETER WEXLER DIGITAL MUSEUM AT FURMAN UNIVERSITY.

In 1958 Mr. Wexler received a Bachelor's degree of science in design (photography and painting) from the University of Michigan's School of Architecture and Design. He also attended the Graduate School of Drama at Yale.
He then designed for off Broadway and television.

In 1958 Mr. Wexler designed "Anthony and Cleopatra", starring the young George C. Scott and
Colleen Dewhurst, for Joseph Papp at the newly formed New York Shakespeare Festival.

He was an early colleague of Gordon Davidson's and a founding member with him, of the Center Theatre Group, Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles.

Mr. Wexler was later a founding member of the Pittsburgh Public
Theatre, performing executive and design functions for it as well as for the Center Theatre Group.

Starting in 1965 with his work for the "Promenades" and then the "Rug Concerts" at the New York
Philharmonic, Mr. Wexler's design and organizational expertise led to producing, programming and/or
theatre and public space design assignments for the Denver Symphony, the National Symphony Orchestra,
the Dallas Symphony, the New York Philharmonic, the Metropolitan Opera and the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

In the 60s and 70s, Mr. Wexler's design work was well represented in regional theatre, on Broadway, television and at the Metropolitan Opera House. He worked, as theatre and concert designer, with Frank Gehry on the re-design of the Hollywood Bowl (1974 - 1977).

He has been principal in extraordinarily complex projects such as the design of scenery, lighting,
costumes, visual effects and the direction of the film for the Metropolitan Opera’s 1973, largest,
ever, production "Les Troyens" and also for extremely simple ones such as the design of the East
Room performance platform for Mrs. John F. Kennedy at the White House in 1961.

Mr. Wexler has produced, programmed, directed, designed and/or raised funds for museum exhibitions,
concerts, public spaces and media events for the U.S. Department of the Navy, the Metropolitan Opera,
the New York Philharmonic, the National Symphony Orchestra, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the
Smithsonian Institution, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, as well as the Trammell Crow
Company, AIRCOA, the Oxford Development Company, E.D.S. (D.S.O. Outdoor Concerts - Ross Perot) and
the Taubman Company (Al Taubman) in the private sector.

Mr. Wexler produced the gala fund-raising concert "Salute to Slava" for the National Symphony Orchestra at the J. F. Kennedy Center, which was televised nationally by WETA. He also provided an environment for the "Boston Pops," starting in 1995.

Late in the 1990s, Mr. Wexler led a lighting, rigging, interior restoration and systems update for the Boston Symphony Orchestra's Symphony Hall. He also consulted with ABC TV NEWS on visual environments for its programs - “Good Morning America”, “20/20”, and “World News Tonight.”

Mr. Wexler was the founder, producer and artistic director of the Spring Creek Festival in Garland, Texas (Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex) from 1992-1994. The festival presented artists ranging from the Dixie Chicks to Mstislav Rostropovich and the National Symphony Orchestra. The Spring Creek Festival is one of the many large outdoor music festivals for which Mr. Wexler has provided production or design and technical expertise.

Perhaps Mr. Wexler’s most unique contribution was in the leadership of design and planning for the Carlos Moseley Music Pavilion (1990-2004). This portable outdoor performance facility was created for the Metropolitan Opera and the New York Philharmonic. Crowds of up to 85,000 people were regularly able to see and hear performances of classical music and opera in it, in New York City’s parks. This high tech facility was capable of being completely erected – ready for sound check in 2 hours with a crew of 11 stage hands and 5 teamsters. It had a portable wireless, 24 speaker tower, distributed sound system and a tension membrane skin, which was used for colorful projections.

Mr. Wexler has taught or guest lectured at the University of Michigan, the State University of New York at Binghamton, the University of Arizona at Tucson, Harvard College, Wellesley Collage and Furman University.

Mr. Wexler's sketches, paintings, models and photographs are widely held in public and private collections, among them the Harvard Theatre Collection and the Cooper Hewitt Museum of the Smithsonian Institution. His graphics have been exhibited at the Library and Museum of the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center, the Max Reinhardt Archive, the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, the Metropolitan Opera Board Room, Avery Fisher Hall, B. Altman's, Fortunoff, Saks Fifth Avenue, the Chase Manhattan Bank, the Cooper-Hewitt, and the Chicago Cultural Center. He has had 18 one-man shows.

His work is extensively collected by the Theatre Collection of the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center (Billy Rose and Jerome Robbins Collections), the Theatre Department of the State University of New York (Binghamton), the Department of Theatre Arts and University Library Special Collections at the University of Arizona (Tucson), the Robert Tobin Collection at the McNay Art Museum in San Antonio, Texas, and the the Digital Collection of the Duke Library at Furman University.

His book, “Reflections / Riflessioni,” may be found in many museums and photographic collections including the library of the Whitney Museum of American Art and the Museum of Contemporary Photography in Chicago.

Additional biographical information about Mr. Wexler may be found in Who's Who (in America-2014,
in American Art-2014), Blue Book and Men of Achievement etc.

Mr. Wexler has been married to EMMY AWARD winning costume designer Constance Ross since 1962.